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The Red Button

Don’t push it!!! Don’t you do it….I’m watching you.

In tribute to what I hope to be long months and years of hilarious commentary between The Hobbler and myself and my induction into her stalker list (at least I think it’s a she…), I decided to do something a little less dark, although it may have serious undertones. It’s kind of an open-ended article in which you get to choose the ending in your comments. It will be up infinitely so hopefully I will get a response or two.

The basic premise of this is that you wake up in a room with one door, no windows and a single solitary post with a red button on top of it. You immediately walk over, checking for anal pains or mysterious stains as you fear you may have been roofied (relieved that everything seems normal), and inspect the object. Taped at the top of the post, which is about waist level, is a note. You look around. No one else is here so it must be for you. You pick the note up, open it and read the contents:

“Dear human,

You have been chosen to decide the fate of the world. Congratulations!

You may have noticed the giant red button in front of you. If not, please look down and do so now. Don’t push it. Trust me. Well, push it if you want, but read this first.

There are two choices:

1)Walk out the door directly to your left. Well, it could be any direction really depending on which direction you’re facing. I hope you can read….this wasn’t the best thought out idea. Anyway, if you walk out that door, the world will continue as normal and you will be magically transported to your home. Not magically, actually. There’s a very scientific process using light and quantum physics. People really don’t appreciate all that goes into it. I mean it took millenniums worth of research, charts and graphs.

2)You push the red button. Doesn’t really matter how you push it. Left-handed, right-handed. I hope you have hands. Otherwise, just headbutt it or something. In the event that you do press the button, the world as you know it will end. It and everything in it will just blink out of existence, never to be seen again.

You may be asking yourself, why me? Well, to be honest I kind of did an “eenie-meenie-minee-moe” and you’re the one that got lucky. If you don’t like that answer, it’s because you were the smartest, most handsome (or beautiful), being on the planet and only you could be chosen. You are the chosen one. Cue spotlights and angel voices.

You may also wonder why you would want to destroy everything. Not that I’m pushing you either way, but have you seen what’s going on in the World? Violence, hate, greed, Starbucks. It’s awful, really. You could erase all of that. I mean, if you wanted to. Feel free to choose the door though, that’s a good choice too. Well, good luck….

Your buddy,

God”

After reading the note, you seem a bid befuddled. You don’t really believe what’s going on, but then again, you’re in the room. The button seems ordinary enough, not the kind of weapon of mass destruction you’d normally think of; kind of reddish…and buttony….

You decide to walk around the room and, SUDDENLY, you fart. Which is a bad idea, frankly. You’re trapped in a closed room and now all you can smell is what seems to be a mixture of sherbet and burrito. Definitely should have opted out of that Chipotle for lunch. I hope you’re proud of yourself.

So, you’re walking around, contemplating what to do. At first it seems obvious. Walk out the door, go back to your life, and change your now horribly smelling clothes. But then, you realize something. If you push the red button you no longer have any problems. All the work piled up in your inbox, the bills sitting on your counter, the memories from when your uncle Ted touched you in your bathing suit area when you were five…all gone. Oh, and all the other bad stuff in the world too.

Also, you’re kind of curious where exactly the room is located. I mean, are you on Earth right now? Are you going to die or just be stuck in this room forever? If you open the door after you push the button will you step out into an empty void of space? Maybe it’s just a test. There could be hidden cameras leading to the room next door where a therapist is holding a clipboard and wondering if it was just a fart he heard earlier, or something more.

You take a deep, foul-tasting, breath and make your decision. You decide to…..

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17 thoughts on “The Red Button”

Of course I’m a she, and this post is a little more like it. Okay, I would probably push the button. Okay definitely, but don’t tell my husband and kids. They might take it personally. I would probably push it and then overanalyze why I did that before checking to see what was outside the room. Hopefully it is something fun, or dangerous or dangerously fun. I think I’m up for an adventure.

Pull out my cell phone, find the GPS (if any). If so, and I have service, then put out a notice for an end of the world flash mob to my GPS Coordinates. Wait for the mob to show up, scream out the door and ask them where the hell I am. Take bids on who wants to be the button pusher and the winner must slide the cash under the door.

Then open the door. Oops… button won’t work now. Sorry winning bidder, no refunds.

The button needs to be pushed, it wants to be pushed, so push it. What’s the worst that could happen. it’s not like the world’s not going to end anyways someday, now is as good as any time. I think I’d open the door first though to get a view of what happens.

I’m taking the button with me and going home. Once I get there, I am going to dig a hole……. ok, maybe not. Nope. No holes. I am going to put the button in a box (so it can’t accidentally get mashed) and wear it on my person all the time. That way, if decide to end it, it will be available.

Now, had this been my story, I would have given different options, and tried to make the second option something other than death. I mean, you can chose life or death in this deal. And I would have to question the validity of the note {squinting eyes}, because I’m pretty sure that God wouldn’t actually give a mere mortal actual choice to end His world.

But, on the other hand, since this is God we’re talking about, He already knows that I’ve absconded with the button intact………. 🙂

I’m glad the note didn’t say, “What ever you do don’t press the button” because whenever someone says that I end up pushing the button even if I don’t really want to. Its out of my control.

I wouldn’t want to push the button because then it would all be over. I’d want to say goodbye to my son, see my grand daughter. If pushing the button meant earth got a “do-over” that would be different but if it means the world just ends I’ll stick it out and see how it all unfolds.